Nighttime
by Veterization
Summary: WARNING: Slight slash Oneshot MWPP Era Remus/Sirius Sirius was cold, so Remus lent a helping hand. Now it's the middle of the night and Remus is asleep on Sirius' shoulder, and Sirius finds he doesn't want to move.


_Disclaimer_: I do not own Harry Potter.

When the hands on clocks circled past the midnight mark, and the common room officially emptied of all supervision and rowdy students hastily finishing homework, and the only illumination keeping the shadows from enveloping the walls were soft flames flickering in the fireplace, Sirius knew bad things were going to happen.

He _knew._

He didn't know whether it was the unbreakable silence; halcyon and tranquil, _too_ tranquil for a noisy boy such as Sirius, meaning he simply _had_ to penetrate it with whatever first fell into his blank mind. Which wasn't always a sensible thing to blurt out.

Or perhaps it was the darkness. The light of the dying embers in the stone fireplace danced on the walls, making long and looming shadows over the floors. But despite the small flames sputtering on their logs, the common room was copious. It was too vast for a thumb-sized fire to illumine efficiently. The sinewy rug in front of the hearth was dotted with light, but the brightness barely licked at the cushions on the couch, so Sirius' face was eclipsed in the shadows as he leant languidly against the pillows, Remus' features equally darkened. The moonlight barely worked its way through the thick curtains cloaking the windows.

The darkness often meddled with Sirius' brain, flummoxing it, teasing it. The darkness let him escape his emotions so all that was left was his raw self, riddled with nothing but unspoken and suppressed thoughts. And most of these suppressed thoughts were better left stifled in Sirius' mind rather than babbled at inopportune moments.

Or perhaps it was the lack of distractions. Sirius was always the center of attention, or somehow worked his way into it. His prankster-like qualities, his default grin, his undeniably attractive features, they drew females and males to him alike like a shark was drawn to blood. But with the common room cleaned of its usual inhabitants, there was no one to clamor over him or fight for his eyes. Instead Sirius had nothing to distract him from the one other beating heart in the room with him.

Sirius vaguely wondered what time it was. He contemplated twisting around and checking the clock propped up on the wall behind him, but there was an unknown magnetism rooting him to the position he was in.

Remus' head had lolled on his shoulder, brown hair splayed over his neck as his forehead nuzzled into Sirius' clavicle. The way the crown of Remus' head fit almost naturally into the crook of his neck was questionable. He expected their bones to push together awkwardly, the whole position cumbersome for both bodies, but it was quite comfortable to have Remus' soft hair tickle his flesh and his cheekbone lay against his shoulder.

Remus' lips parted gently, a warm puff of air landing on Sirius' flesh. He shivered as the hot air hit his skin, tickling it gingerly. The werewolf's breathing was rhythmic and untroubled, implying that Remus had succumbed to the arms of slumber. Sirius didn't remember when he had drifted off into the silence; he hadn't checked the time in what felt like hours. The way a soft light was drifting into the sky to murk with the ebony night and morph into a dull gray made it seem as though it was approaching the ghastly hours of the morning. Sirius felt as though he was sitting on this couch, Remus asleep against him, for ages.

A scarred arm was furled loosely over his hip, brushing against his waist every time Remus exhaled and his chest rose slowly.

It had only started because Sirius had been cold.

Except that he hadn't been all that cold.

It was what he _claimed_, however, with a pout that would make even the most morose puppies envious.

He had leaned over to Remus' armchair, sprawled over the couch as he did so, letting out a whiny pule, "I'm cold, Moony."

Out of the corner of his peripheral vision, James gave Remus an edgy look.

"Dude," he had advised Sirius, "go to bed."

Sirius pretended not to hear him, still shooting a sulk in Remus' general direction. The other boy finally sighed and got up from his armchair, pushing Sirius' invasive shoulder out of the way as he settled himself on the couch and wrapped a cumbersome arm around Sirius' waist.

At the time, the positioning and propinquity was more than uncomfortable. Remus' uneasiness in the excess contact – contact that most boys in sixth year protested was too effeminate for them to be having with their mates – was keeping their embrace at a meek one-armed cuddle. But there was only so long someone's muscles could be tensed to the point of breakage for the sake keeping flesh from touching other flesh, and within five minutes Remus was using Sirius more as a human pillow than the spear he must have imagined him to be before.

So an unknown amount of minutes later, possibly even tens of minutes, Sirius found himself unable to move with Remus' body laying against his as though it had found its dying spot.

And Sirius dare not move.

If it was James or Peter, collapsed on his lap or snoring on his jugular, he wouldn't have much trouble shoving the boys away with pushy palms, muttering for them to get their own mattress. But it seemed almost sinful to tell Remus to stop invading his personal space, especially when he had yet to be bothered by it, but rather the contrary.

Sirius tried to think of reasons why this was the case. His mind blanked.

Remus' eyes alone, closed without a crease and ebony lashes brushing against his cheeks softly, were peaceful. His equanimity and serenity was almost desirable, but even though sleep was tugging on Sirius' eyelids impatiently, he refused to let himself fall into his dreams and miss such a rare moment.

He was almost positive that it wouldn't be recreated any time soon. It was too intimate of an embrace by now, despite the fact that both boys had naturally melded into it. If Sirius would one night feel bold and shameless again and request for Remus to warm him once more, he doubted that the werewolf would comply. Their innocuous hug for warmth was definitely not all so innocent anymore.

But, _oh_, his body heat. It was always warm when Remus was near. His body seemed to radiate heat like a human furnace, and if warm was too tame of a word, then steamy and sticky would be suitable replacements. _Too_ sticky for even a summer day in the midst of the July humidity. For someone as icy and bitter as the wolf within him, it almost surprised Sirius that Remus' skin itself was pumping blood that almost always seemed to boil.

If he had ever been cold in the first place, Sirius definitely wasn't anymore. He apprehensively let an arm of his own wander through the darkness, a movement he wasn't even aware of until he fell out of the subconscious he had slipped into and back into awareness, and let his hand brush against Remus' hip. It was a gentle, curious touch, and Sirius prayed with all of his worth that the other boy wouldn't wake up. It wasn't that he didn't have excuses piled up in his mind in case Remus was pulled from his slumber, but in all candor, he didn't want to have to make excuses.

But despite a small twitch at the unexpected contact, Remus' quiescent expression remained undisturbed. Sirius increased the pressure of his contact, his fingertips suffering from a small tremor as he realized his nerves were overwhelming the better part of his brain. Sirius' palm finally settled itself comfortably on Remus' hipbone, rising up and down slowly in rhythm with his breathing.

The touch itself was minor, but it was perhaps the intentions behind the contact that wasn't. Sirius' brain was going a hundred miles an hour, all previous desires of sleep forgotten. The only contemplation torturing his haunted mind was Remus, and only Remus.

_Remus_.

The overpowering want to press his fingertips against Remus' skin was unavoidable. Sirius glanced at the werewolf's facial features once again, looking for the slightest indications of discomfort, but his mouth was furled into a phlegmatic line and his complexion remained shadowed in the darkness peacefully.

Sirius, all hesitance dispersing into capricious impulsiveness, hooked his index finger into the hem of Remus' shirt and pulled it up slowly. Another soft breath ran through Remus' body, this time a shudder accompanying it as Sirius pressed his thumb against the newly-exposed skin at his waist.

But Remus' reaction to having the other boy touch him was far from noticeable compared to the impact it had on Sirius. He let out a breath he wasn't aware he was holding in and brushed two more fingers against the skin, glabrous and smooth with the exception of a stray scar running over one of his ribs. Another hot breath escaped from his tongue, his palpitations beginning to feel heavy against his chest.

Sirius was now firmly convinced that it was the nighttime and the puzzlement of it all that was playing with his head and inflicting such wants on it. They were all things he wouldn't dare to think of in the daytime, not with girls at his every which way and a good game of Quidditch to distract him. In the daylight there were pranks to pull and a Hogsmeade visit to worry about sneaking into and professors to evade.

In the nighttime, all there was was Remus.

No distractions, no James, no girls to be coy with, not anything but the feel of Remus' skin and the sound of his voice.

Or perhaps it was only an illusion that Sirius was persuading himself of so desperately. That by morning, Remus' arms gone and replaced with the stiffness of his sheets, this incident would be nothing but a fading memory. That the moment James would be tugging him off to sneak into the kitchens or Peter would steal all of the bacon off of the breakfast platter, his distractions would once more push Remus off into the corners of his mind where he normally resided. The area where his _friends_ resided.

The only problem was that Sirius was well aware that his chimerical fantasy of his brain waking up with a surprise case of amnesia, forgetting all about Remus and the desires that had been hibernating into dormancy in his brain for years, was truly nothing but wishful thinking.

Whether he wanted to admit it or not, he had crossed a line. Too far. So far that the line was nothing but a dot in the distance for him now. Another sigh echoed after the previous ones falling from Sirius' lips and lingered in the room.

After the subconscious confession and confirmation of its veracity came the hope. And the unfortunate realization that it was truly nothing _but_ hope.

Sirius' thumb brushed against Remus' hipbone, enjoying the gentle shiver that racked Remus' body as he slept on. His hair tickled the raven's clavicle even more, causing an inevitable smile to work its way onto Sirius' lips despite the growing trouble brewing in his mind and the hurt of wanting something he couldn't have plaguing his thoughts. He let his hand ghost up to Remus' waist, pushing the flimsy fabric of his shirt out of the way as he did so. More warm skin, another scar, another tremor, and all of it felt flawless under Sirius' curious fingers. With his bare, fleeting fingertips, Sirius wanted to memorize the feel of Remus' skin.

_It's not like_, Sirius mused with another sigh, his fingers still refusing to stop their ministrations, _you'll ever have anything more_.

It really was a shame that he could only really enjoy the feel of Remus and his shudders of concealed pleasure while he was deep within the realms of sleep.

Nighttime, Sirius thought, along with a heart, really were wastes.

Sirius pulled his fingers slowly away from Remus' body almost as if they were glued to his waist with sticky toffee. His instinct screamed at him to return them to the proximity of his own body, but there was an aching desire to keep his appendages on Remus no matter what gravity pulled them away.

There was a loud thumping enveloping Sirius' eardrums, and whether it was his own heartbeat or Remus', he wasn't certain. But through the beating in his ear and the palpitations engulfing his dwindling sanity, Sirius reached up and laid his palm on Remus' cheek, his knuckles stroking the scar under his eyelid that plagued his complexion.

There was something very calming about the feel of Remus' cheek under his fingers. The sight and feel of such soft and creamy skin – even flooded in the shadows – mollified the chaos threatening to haunt Sirius' mind for as long as Remus would be resting against his torso.

"Remus," he breathed out, the name barely even leaving his lips as he spoke it, quiet and soft and only meant for the two souls barely even conscious in the Gryffindor common room, "Remus, do you…"

But his question slowly faded into nothingness, silence once again gracing the space. Nothing but the soft humming of the flames dying out and the susurrus of the trees as wind soughed through towering oaks and pines. Off in the distance through the film of the window Sirius could detect the Whomping Willow whistle with the aid of the breeze working its way through its branches.

The remainder of his inquiry seemed to sputter and die on his tongue, barely making it past his lips. Now that his words were dead from trepidation and dread, Sirius almost forgot what he had been itching to say.

Perhaps it was because Remus wasn't awake to reply. Perhaps it was because Sirius wasn't brave enough to finish. Or perhaps it was because in all truth, brave faces and interminable smiles aside, Sirius was a coward, and he was afraid of the answer he would receive.

_AN_: Hmmm… yes, it is a bit short and lacking of physical contact, which normally drives me mad. But I think it's more meaningful this way.

In a way, it was sort of Sirius' side of his and Remus' relationship in comparison to my other story _Risks_, where it was only Remus who felt anything. I'm not saying this is a sequel or the stories are somehow in the same time frame, but it simply wasn't fair to write Remus pining for something and not Sirius too!

Short and meaningful are sometimes the best stories of all :D

It's dedicated to anyone who ever had to pine after someone or still is.


End file.
